Nicholas Edwards Is National Player of the Week

Oct 24, 2011

Junior wide receiver ties school record with four TD
receptions in come-from-behind overtime win at Sacramento
State

Junior Nicholas Edwards has earned a variety of
national NCAA Football Championship Subdivision honors, including
The Sports Network/Fathead.com co-National Player of Week, after
tying a school record with four touchdown receptions in EWU’s
42-35 come-from-behind overtime victory over Sacramento State on
Oct. 22.

He also earned National Performer of the Week and National Wide
Receiver of the Week from College Football Performance Awards.
Edwards was named Big Sky Conference Offensive Player of the Week
as well, giving EWU a string of three-straight weeks in winning the
award. Quarterback Bo Levi Mitchell won the last
two BSC awards for the Eagles, who host Portland State on Senior
Day this Saturday (Oct. 29) at 1:05 p.m. Pacific time at Roos Field
in Cheney, Wash.

Also honored by the league was senior kicker Mike
Jarrett, who
made field goals of 28 and 41 yards against Sacramento State to
earn Big Sky Conference Special Teams Player of the Week honors. He
is an impressive 14-of-16 kicking field goals this season, and is
just one field goal from setting the single season school record
for field goals and only 15 points from EWU’s career record
for kick scoring.

Edwards finished the Sac State game with 11 catches for a
career-high 192 receiving yards, and had TD catches of 35, 16, 39
and 22 yards from Mitchell. Jamie Buenzli had four
touchdown catches versus Nevada on Sept. 12, 1987, and Joe Pierce
had four against Central Washington on Sept. 13, 2003.

Three of his TD catches came in the fourth quarter, and he added
a 17-yard reception in overtime that set-up a go-ahead 1-yard
touchdown run by Jordan Talley. The 11 catches for
Edwards versus the Hornets equaled the 11th-most in school history
and his yards ranks eighth. The 2008 graduate of Foss High School
in Tacoma, Wash., has had performances of 13 catches (second in
school history), 12 (seventh) and 10 (19th) earlier this
season.

“When you have on your team Jerry Rice, I mean Nick
Edwards, it’s hard not to get him the ball,” joked
Mitchell after the Sac State win, in which the Eagles rallied from
a 28-13 deficit. “He works hard and puts in the effort and
time. He deserves everything he gets and deserves the credit for
this win. The plays he made tonight were just
ridiculous.”

The 64 catches for Edwards this season already ranks as the
10th-most in school history, and his 11 receiving touchdowns are
ninth. He ranks fifth in FCS in receptions per game (8.0) and is
eighth in receiving yards per game (105.3). In his career, Edwards
already has 21 touchdown receptions to rank fifth in school
history, and has caught a total of 147 passes (ninth all-time at
EWU) for 1,790 yards.

Mitchell passed for 357 yards in the victory over Sac State, and
now ranks second in FCS with an average of 342.0 passing yards per
game. He now has 20 touchdown passes on the season after setting
the school record with 37 a year ago. He needs just 264 passing
yards to record only the 11th performance by an Eagle of at least
3,000 passing yards in a single season.

The Eagles have won their last four games after a 0-4 start for
the 2010 NCAA Division I Champions.

“Those two were at it again,” said Baldwin after the
Sac State win. “Bo’s last three games have been unreal
and Nick has been consistent all season. And I’m proud of our
offensive line that has gone through a lot of changes. We have a
lot of players banged and bruised, but we’re still finding
ways to put up points and get yards.”

Junior Greg Herd, who had 13 catches for 128
yards and a pair of scores in the final four games of 2010, has
added 51 catches for 690 yards and five scores thus far this year.
He currently ranks 16th in FCS in receptions per game (6.38) and is
18th in receiving yards per game (86.3). And even sophomore
Ashton Clark, buried in the depth chart and with
no career catches entering the season, has 23 grabs for 322 yards
and a pair of scores thus far.

Eastern All-America receiver Brandon Kaufman
had a sensational season in 2010, but Edwards produced even bigger
numbers for the Eagles in the latter stages of 2010 and the first
part of the 2011 season. In the last four games of last year and
first four this season before he was lost for the season with a
hand injury, Kaufman caught 50 passes for 565 yards and six
touchdowns, while Edwards caught 59 for 647 and eight touchdowns in
the same time frame.

Kaufman broke a metacarpal in his left hand in the Montana State
game on Sept. 24, and will apply for a medical redshirt and miss
the rest of the season. That, and a season-ending injury to senior
Tyler Hart, has opened the door for Edwards and
Herd to become EWU’s premier receivers this season.